


Objects in Space

by Fifthnameattempt



Category: Naruto
Genre: Crew as Family, Firefly AU, Found Family, Gen, Slow Burn, Space Cowboy Ninjas, Starship Captain Hatake says change needs to be systemic or it is meaningless
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-20
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:07:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27113753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fifthnameattempt/pseuds/Fifthnameattempt
Summary: When the Earth was used up, humanity found a new galaxy and terraformed five new planets and hundreds of moons to create new earths. The central planets formed an Alliance and went to war to bring the rest under their control. Independents loyal to old traditions tried to fight it but were brought down after the death of their leader. The survivors live on the edge of civilization, holding on desperately to what freedom remains. A ship gets you work. A gun helps you keep it. A captain’s goal is simple: Find a crew. Find a job. Keep flying.__Kakashi fought the good fight once. He fought it until he lost everything and then he kept on fighting. All he wants now is to captain his little ship in peace and keep himself out of trouble. That plan is going pretty well until a mild-mannered teacher smuggles a ghost from Kakashi's past on board with him.
Relationships: Hatake Kakashi/Umino Iruka
Comments: 3
Kudos: 20





	1. PART ONE

**Author's Note:**

> I've playing around with this AU for a while, but I was feeling particularly happy with it today and decided to bite the bullet and post part of it. My goal is to write out a complete version of the pilot episode, enough to establish the world and the rules, and then dip back into it when particular ideas strike. It probably won't be a full length series ever because I don't have that kind of patience, but I do have a lot of ideas for this odd world currently taking up space inside my head!
> 
> As I was writing this, I found myself wondering if it was still 'cool' to be super into Firefly or if that was played out? And then I acknowledged that I am still writing Naruto fanfiction in the Year of Our Lord 2020 and 'cool' was never something I was going to be anyway. Enjoy fun space times with me!!

Thirteen years ago, a Federal research lab called Kyubi Station crashed down on a small, but populous moon called Uzushio. Hundreds of thousands of people died and the once-stable moon’s ecology collapsed, creating a refugee crisis of a scale never before seen in the galaxy. The tragedy was blamed on a cell of radical Independents who infiltrated the lab and died in the explosion.

The Independents wouldn’t formally surrender for another three years, but they lost the galaxy the day Kyubi came down.

The war has been over for a decade, the Alliance’s reign over the galaxy’s smaller orbits is nearly total. The spaces where men like Captain Kakashi Hatake can live undisturbed get smaller with each passing year.

The vastness of space had fascinated Kakashi for most of his life. As a small boy on his father’s homestead, he’d look up at the black space between stars and imagined a life without heavy atmosphere weighing him down. As a child soldier, he’d learned that he was safest in the dark. As a young man fighting on the frontlines of a war about to be lost, he had looked up and taken comfort in his utter smallness in the face of it.

These days, even the void is starting to feel tight.

“Captain, we’re made.”

The words make him stop staring wistfully out at points of light and Kakashi gives himself a moment to curse in the privacy of his vacsuit before opens the mic in his helmet. “How long do we have?”

“Ten minutes and counting at their current rate.” The pilot’s voice is tinny and high over the speakers in his suit, but coldly calm. If he’s worried about their imminent arrests and possible executions, he doesn’t let it show in his voice. “We’re not being painted with anything. I suspect they don’t realize we’re here quite yet.”

“They’re probably responding to the same emergency code as us.” Kakashi sighs. “The one time those assholes bother to –!” He takes a breath, refocuses, “Do you think they can pick up our transponder?”

“At this distance, it’s unlikely, but I can’t say for sure without knowing exactly which model cruiser they’re flying.”

“Mah, let’s not get that close.” Kakashi shakes his head even though the pilot can’t see. “Drop the Cry Baby and set it on a course as far from our route as possible, but otherwise stay dark until everyone’s on board. We don’t want to give them anything to look at before we’re ready to punch it.”

“The ‘cry baby’, sir?”

Kakashi holds back a sigh. “The decoy beacon Asuma strapped to an old fuel barrel and a booster pack. We call it the cry baby because – never mind why, just get it ready.”

“Aye, Captain.” Is the clipped response and then the line goes dead. Mentally, Kakashi adds teaching the kid a sense of humor to his list of things to do. _Stow the cargo, buy fuel, teach Sai a few knock-knock jokes_.

He opens a line to the rest of the crew. “Gai, Yamato: grab what you’re carrying and get back to the ship. We’re about to have company of a most unpleasant nature. Asuma, meet us in the hold and get ready to stow the cargo. I don’t want any suspicious looking boxes hanging around just in case we get boarded.”

Three affirmatives echo over the line and then it goes dead. Kakashi waits at the edge of the breached hull, ready to drag through the stretch of vacuum between ships.

Gai comes up first, pushing one container out of the breach with a grin, two more tied together and towed behind him. The containers are two feet wide and four feet thick and would weigh about one hundred fifty pounds under pressure. In vacuum, they float with the gentlest touches. Kakashi catches the handle of the first container and magnetizes his glove, letting Gai’s forward momentum start to push him away from the ship.

Yamato follows Gai, pulling a container of his own. Kakashi gives him a moment to stick himself to one of Gai’s containers then opens a line to both of them, “Locked?”

“Locked, Captain!” Gai’s voice blows out his microphone and ‘Captain’ is mostly static but Kakashi’s used to it at this point.

“Locked and set,” Yamato says, a sea of calm by comparison. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

“Firing off.” Kakashi gives them just that moment of warning before firing the thrusters on his engineering rig and towing the whole merry band home. Behind them, the doors of the low bay open on silent hinges that would have shrieked in atmosphere, and the Cry Baby floats into view briefly before its own thrusters fire up and it streaks off into the black.

The trip to the main airlock takes about two minutes, then another thirty seconds to cycle completely. Every second rings in Kakashi’s head, another moment closer to an unpleasant meeting with the Feds. He really hopes they take the bait.

Gravity comes back first, all three of them dropping to onto suddenly heavy feet as the gravity engine takes hold. The containers drop to the ground with an impressive BANG that is muffled by the thing air. Kakashi’s helmet politely lets him know when it’s safe to remove now, even though the wail of the proximity alarm as it cuts through pressurized atmosphere was warning enough.

He de-magnetizes his hold on the container and strips off the engineering rig as the main bay doors rattle open, revealing the cargo hold and Asuma, who furiously chews nicotine gum while wielding a giant wrench against the bolts to a smuggling hold hidden behind the paneling of the far wall.

Abandoning the rig where it falls in the airlock, Kakashi ducks under the bay door and into the cargo hold. He grabs the intercom mic and opens a line to the bridge, “Yo, Sai, how’re we looking?”

“They seem to be taking the bait.” Sai, his voice staticky and thinner than ever over the interior intercom – the intercom becomes one more item on the already impossibly long list of things on his boat that need fixing – informs him. “They’ve pitch corrected and are put on slightly more burn in the direction of the false emergency beacon.”

“Give them half a minute to get out of our direct course and then book it.” Kakashi orders. “I don’t want to be here when they figure out what they’re actually chasing.”

“Aye, Captain.”

“I said we shouldn’t have taken the long way out.” Asuma says with a grunt as one panel drops free, revealing the large, temperature-controlled space behind it. The notoriously easy-going man could be damn near sour when he worked himself up to it. “We’d on our way back to Persephone by now.”

“Assuming we didn’t run afoul of the same cruiser on the way out.” Kakashi says with an easy smile. “Besides, what would your Ambassador have done if we had made such good time? She can’t cut her meetings short just because you get back early. And you’d miss her if we weren’t keeping you busy.”

“I didn’t – she’s not. She ain’t an ambassador and you know it, you ass!” Before Kurenai had started renting the ship’s spare shuttle, Kakashi had never known Asuma to blush. Now, Kakashi didn’t even have to use her name to set him stammering.

“Let’s get these stored in a hurry.” Kakashi skips over the rest of that particular conversation, gesturing to the containers. “I don’t want to take chances. We get caught, we don’t get paid.”

Yamato has his helmet off and is already sliding a dolly under one container. He glares pointedly in the direction of Kakashi’s abandoned rig. “You know we only have one of those, don’t you?” He still asks with just as much fervor as the very first time he asked it. “If we take external damage and the rig isn’t in working operation, what do you think happens to us?”

“I’d really rather not find out.” Kakashi shrugs like he always does. “I prefer not to take external damage.”

Kakashi doesn’t need to see him to know Asuma shakes his head at the same time Yamato glares and Gai laughs.

“Your answers are always so Cool and Aloof, Captain!” Gai bellows, effortlessly lifting one container over his shoulder. “Surely you would not allow the ship to fall into disrepair!”

“Of course not.” Kakashi nods, “I’ll have it cleaned up in a moment.”

But as Gai and Yamato walk their loads to the far end of the hold, Kakashi does not move to pick up the rig. He kneels in front of the nearest container and opens it as quietly as possible.

_‘Grade-A foodstuff’_ is what Dragonfly had called the take. Enough pure protein and vitamins to kick start a small colony, assuming the colony ship didn’t lose power and have to scatter in life preserving pods on the trip out. It’s worth a small fortune on the fringe of the solar system. Kakashi picks up a bar for closer inspection. The silver foil wrapper is sealed, the weight is good, the smell is right. He flips it over, just in case, and…

_Well shit,_ he thinks.

There’s a _Kiri_ seal stamped into the bottom, on the foil and likely on the ration bar itself. That hadn’t been a regular settlement ship, it had been a _granted_ settlement ship. Resale of Alliance settlement good was strictly prohibited, and Kiri was particularly ruthless when it came to enforcement. These would be harder to move and worth less than typical ration bars.

“Everything alright with the take, Captain?”

Kakashi glances up, face carefully neutral, and smiles at Yamato, who is already close to hovering over him. He replaces the bar and shuts the container quickly before he can see. Yamato always was quicker than Kakashi wanted him to be. It made him a great first officer and a terrible person to hide things from.

“Just looking it over. Everything’s in order.” That’s technically true. They’d only been hired to pick up, they didn’t have to move the product itself. Their fee was practically guaranteed. Kakashi stands up before Yamato can push further and shouts out, “Gai! A challenge! Who can get their box across the hold fastest?”

“Oh, HO, my Esteemed Rival, I _accept_ your challenge!” Gai responds with his usual enthusiasm. Kakashi offers Yamato a lazy smile as he hauls one of the two remaining containers over his shoulder. It’s a burn, but in a good way. He’d been on the float for more than an hour, waiting for them to clear and secure the dead ship. He needed to warm up his muscles again anyway.

Yamato mutters something that sounds suspiciously like ‘I hope you throw out your back’ and moves to clean up the dropped rig as Gai and Kakashi square off.

“Three!”

“Two.”

“One!”

“GOOOOOOO!” They shout together and sprint across the hold. It’s barely more than a moment’s distraction, but when you live this close to the raw edge of the ‘verse, every second counts.

The eighteen-hour trip back to Persephone doesn’t produce any other dangers, except for the way entering atmosphere on low fuel with always makes for a turbulent trip. Fortunately, Sai’s better at piloting than he is at engaging in conversation and they make it to their berth in one piece. Once they’re on the ground, all five crew members make it down to the hold and start packing up the skid, eager for the payout and the kind of time apart you can’t get in the black.

“Hey, Asuma,” Kakashi calls the older man over when it’s clear that between Gai’s strength, Yamato’s direction, and Sai’s inability to engage in nonsense, they’ve got packing covered. “I need you to hang out at the docks while we’re gone. See if you can pick up a few passengers.”

“We haven’t had passengers in a while.” Asuma observes without judgement, but there’s a certain tilt to his cigarette – he can smoke now, since they’re breathing free air and the bay’s open – that suggests curiosity at least. “And the extra bunks are looking a little worse for wear these days. Any particular reason we’re taking on passengers now?”

“Mah,” Kakashi shrugs, “Passengers are fun, aren’t they? With their little lives and they’re stories? It’s been just the five of us for too long. We need fresh blood. Plus, the extra income never hurts.”

“…okay.” Asuma says, doubt in every stretched-out syllable. “Where should I say we’re headed?”

“Why not Shimo?” Kakashi suggests, like he’s coming up with it on the spot. “It’s a good transfer hub, lots of professional ferries stop over there to refuel before heading back into the core or out to the edges, should be easy to sell passengers on. Plus, Jiraiya’s there and he’s always got a few decent leads for us if we give him a couple days’ warning.”

Asuma nods slowly then crosses his arms, leaning back to match Kakashi’s relaxed posture and asks, “Enough extra income to cover those new heating coils I’ve been asking for?”

“Easy there, Sarutobi.” Kakashi says, “We only want two or three passengers; we’ve hardly got the bunk space for more!”

“The heating coils go they take the whole compression unit with.” Asuma says darkly, his playful posturing gone. “No compression unit and we’re on the float.”

“Compression unit best not go then.” Kakashi says cheerfully, glad the skid is packed up and Gai and Yamato are looking at him expectantly. Stepping away, he says the last bit loud enough for the rest of the crew to hear. “Focus on getting paying passengers. If they pay well enough, _then_ we’ll talk about new engine parts.”

Gai grins and starts talking about how much he likes having new people on the ship while Yamato gives him yet another level look as he helps the captain onto the back of the skid.

“Passengers?” He asks, “You’re sure there’s nothing I should know about the take before we see Genma?”

“You’re so suspicious of me lately, Tenzo!” Kakashi sighs, laying his hand across his heart like it hurts him. “Remember the old days? You used to trust my every word!”

“I’ve learned better.” His eyes twitches at the use of his old name, but something distracts him from pressing the issue.

Kakashi follows his gaze to the stony, but strained expression on the face of their newest crew member. Belatedly, Kakashi remembers this will be Sai’s first run with passengers. He still remembers how Tenzou had felts about strangers in the early days. Smiling as reassuringly as he can manage, Kakashi says, “Passengers stick to common areas of the ship. They won’t bother you in your room or on the bridge.”

The pilot nods once, sharply, as bad at expressing relief as he is at expressing discomfort. It’s a little impressive, how good Yamato is at catching it. Sai asks, “Can I access ship funds to purchase fuel?”

It’s always money with these people, Kakashi sighs internally. “Wait until we get the payout. Shouldn’t take us more than an hour. Let’s get it moving, Gai!”

Kakashi and Yamato pile onto the back of the sled and when Gai revs the engine, they lurch unevenly out of the hold and onto the crowded dock. Yamato halfway slides off his seat with a curse before Kakashi catches him and hauls him back up.

“What’s the matter?” The captain teases, “You don’t like Gai’s driving?”

Yamato scowls, “I just wish he’d be a bit less… enthusiastic.”

Kakashi laughs, “Yamato, I don’t think there’s a power in the ‘verse could stop Gai from being enthusiastic.”

“God _damnit_ , Kakashi!” Yamato was a thoughtful, respectful first officer. He knew Kakashi’s past intimately and was always careful not to drag things up Kakashi didn’t want talked over. His opinions were delivered with careful consideration and at the appropriate moments.

Unless, of course, he was feeling _righeoust_. “I knew there was something wrong with the take when you wouldn’t let us see it! Oh, _oh!_ And you had Asuma take on passengers! You knew we wouldn’t be able to afford enough gas to breach atmo without the extra cash. You pinch-penny _gasbag_ , why do you always do this!?”

Kakashi is content to let his second wear himself out on the ride home, but Gai can never keep himself from interjecting. “Ah, taking on passengers as a back up was a brilliant move, Captain!” He beams and narrowly avoids knocking over a fruit vendor’s stall in the crowded market. “You truly are a genius!”

Finally, Kakashi gives into the urge to sigh. Gai calling him a genius was _always_ an omen of doom.

“Look, it wasn’t some master stroke.” He says. “Passengers were just a precaution. I really expected Dragonfly to take the goods. He knew the catch and the coordinates; he must have known they were marked. He’s been looking for a reason to stiff us – we’ve had a few jobs go well with him and he doesn’t want us getting chummy or trying to get a better cut. We’re better off selling this haul on our own, anyhow. No middleman to take a cut.”

“And who do you know that will risk buying _Kiri_ -marked rations?” Yamato demands, arms folded over his chest. Kakashi’s glad he keeps three quarters of his faced covered at all times because it keeps the dust out of his nose _and_ hides his twitch of concern.

“We’ll think of someone.” He intones, searching his mind frantically. “We can always take it to Oto.”

“All due respect, sir.” Yamato says in a tone of voice that suggests the level of respect due is _none_. “Didn’t Gozu shoot you last time we were on Oto?”

“Mah, he barely grazed me.” Kakashi shrugs, resting his hands in his pockets. “From what I hear, he’s practically mayor of that moon these days, our little disagreement is sure to be forgotten. In fact, they might even be glad of the supplies. Ya know what, the more I talk about it, the more certain I am that Oto’s our next landing.”

Yamato scoffs, overbalances trying to keep from falling off the sled when Gai clips a curb taking the next turn, then returns to scowling. “Sure, perfect. We’ll go a day and a half out of our way to Shimo and deliver our very illegal cargo to an unstable psychopath who has already tried to murder you once, and I’m certain our new passengers will have no questions and cause no problems whatsoever.”

There’s another twitch, this one high on Kakashi’s left cheekbone. He probably should have put more thought into their passenger destination. He’ll need a good excuse for why they’re going to far off course without losing passengers. Grinning his brightest grin behind the mask, Kakashi just tells Yamato,. “I’m glad you understand!”

A thorough tour of the _Kyubi_ wouldn’t take more than an hour. It’s basically a big circle. Walking straight through the cargo hold and down the narrow hallway, takes you to the passed the infirmary and then into the three passenger cabins and that’s the entirety of the lower deck. Climbing the ladder on the far back wall puts you a step outside of the engine room, turn left instead and you’re in the mess. Keep walking and you’re passing crew cabins, the only head with a shower, and then it’s either up the short stairs to the bridge or back down into the hold.

The tour Kakashi gives their passengers takes twenty minutes. He nods in the direction of the engine room and the bridge, but doesn’t offer to take them into either. He ends in the mess with the little speech he’s been rehearsing in his head.

“…and there’s food in the kitchen. Mostly your basic ration kits and what not, but you’re welcome to help yourself to what’s there. We do share a meal about once every twenty four hours. Helps keeps the days straight.” He clears his throat, and carefully transitions to the only non-standard part of this speech. “And, uh, speaking of days. We’ve received an order to carry some supplies to a small moon a little out of our original flight plan. It’s going to add about a day and a half to our journey. If any of you have time sensitive matters to attend to, we won’t hold it against you if you want to take back your fare and find transport with someone else.”

That’s the biggest gamble of the whole thing. Kakashi practically holds his breath as he waits to see if anyone takes him up on the offer. In the corner of the room, he can see Yamato doing the same thing. They’ve already spent the passenger fare on fuel.

“Does that happen often?” A dark-haired young man asks after a beat where no one steps up to demand a refund. “The Alliance just sends small transport ships on assignments? What are you carrying?”

“I don’t rightly know.” Kakashi resists the urge to frown. That was not the part of the story he was expecting to have to defend. He gives the other man as subtle of a once-over as he can. “You’re Shinrai, right?” He waits for the younger man to nod before continuing. “You from a Core planet, Shinrai?”

“Oh, uh, yeah.” He gives a weak smile, scratching awkwardly as the corner of a light scar that runs over his nose and cheekbones. “Sort of.”

“Out here when the Alliance says ‘Jump,’ we usually just say ‘Yes, sir’. Hasn’t done us much good to ask questions in the past. You’ll get used to it.” Yamato is glaring at him, Kakashi can _feel_ it. But he also can’t regret cutting down a little upstart Core kid heading off into the wild black yonder to get some street cred back home. It’s gratifying to see the other man turn a shade darker under his tan as the embarrassment sets in.

“Well surely it’s a good thing, though.” The other male passenger – white haired, with glasses, ugh, Kakashi really needs to learn all their names – offers peaceably, “People need help and the Alliance trusts you to get the job done. Must be nice.”

Kakashi turns his only visible eye on the other man and wishes he hadn’t already pissed off one passenger today. Yamato would castrate him if he drove off _two_. He smiles and tries not to make it sound forced as he makes a serious of sounds that imply agreement.

“Do you have anything else to say that I care to hear about, or can I go to my bunk now?” The hand waving through the air with every word has a distinctively… _languid_ quality to it that suggests their only female passenger has been drinking for the better part of the day and it’s somewhere around eleven am on the world outside.

Kakashi’s smile for her is slightly more genuine. He doesn’t mind a drunk as long as they come with their own supplies. “Actually, there is just one more thing,” He adds, like it’s an afterthought, “We ask that all passengers confine themselves strictly to the mess and their bunks for the duration of the flight. The engine room, cargo hold, and bridge are all strictly off limits for your own safety and that of the crew.”

“My things are in the cargo hold.” The dark-haired man says quickly, the flush disappearing as worry overtakes his expression.

“We expected that.” Kakashi nods, “I’ll have crew to escort you into the hold to retrieve your things as soon as we’re in flight, but after that, as I said, strictly off limits.”

Overall, they’re a pretty passive, dull bunch, Kakashi thinks. Exactly the kind of people they needed to keep the lights on without sticking their noses anywhere unhelpful. He’s pretty sure this whole thing is going to work itself out.

They manage to pass one entire meal in peace. Tsunade, the drunk, has apparently paid part of her fare in fresh fruits and vegetables which Kakashi would have objected to if he’d been consulted, but he wasn’t so he just enjoys a good meal. Kabuto, boot-licker, turns out to be surprisingly funny for a prospector and he and Gai swap stories about strange, out of the way moons Kakashi’s never heard of.

Shinrai also turns out to be less of a spoiled Core kid than Kakashi’s first impression suggested. He’s taking a teaching posting on a new settlement; his oversized (over _protected_ ) luggage is meant to supply his new students for at least the next five years. When Kakashi lets slip that he grew up (to age six, ha) on a homestead, the teacher peppers him with so many questions the Captain eventually has to put his book down and focus on keeping his lies straight.

Kakashi gets his revenge by introducing the teacher to Kurenai and watching him flounder through his first-ever conversation with a registered companion. It’s not the worst evening that’s ever been passed on the _Kyubi_ by a long shot. Sai doesn’t make an appearance, but Yamato snags enough food for a plate for him, so Kakashi doesn’t worry about it. Might be good for the kid to get used to strangers, eventually.

_Yeah,_ Kakashi thinks to himself, _This is definitely working._

Less than three hours later, Kakashi is trying to keep all the blood from pouring out of a gun shot in Asuma’s stomach and he thinks, ‘ _Why can’t it ever go smooth?’_

The lights in Kakashi’s cabin are cycled down to half, his book is open and in front of him, but he’s mostly dozed off. He’s pretty sure if he can manage not to move for another ten minutes he’ll actually fall asleep.

“Captain, it’s urgent!” Sai’s voice crackles over the intercom and Kakashi chucks his pillow at the speaker.

Slapping his hand down on the microphone button, he demands, “ _What_ , Sai!?”

“There’s a beacon… someone on the ship has sent an emergency beacon to the nearest Alliance interceptor.” Sai’s tone is cool, but quick paced. Kakashi feels his heartrate soar with each word. “I’m shutting it down, but I have no idea how much data went out before I spotted the feed.”

Kakashi curses, “Why don’t you ever have _good news_ for me, huh?”

“Captain, I cannot control the-“

“Of course not, I’m sorry, kid.” Kakashi presses his palm to his good eye until it bursts with color. Snapping at Sai isn’t going to help anyone. “Monitor the hell out of that interceptor, inform me the second it moves, but don’t deviate from our course unless I say so. Tell Gai, Yamato, and Asuma what’s going on – in that order – and have them meet me by the passenger cabins. I’m going to mole hunting.”

“Understood, Captain.”

Gai meets him in the mess, which is empty.

“What’s the plan, Captain?” He asks, voice low and serious.

“Clear the spare shuttle and then make sure Kurenai is alright. I’ll meet you in the hold once I’ve cleared the passenger cabins.” Kakashi doesn’t need to call them orders to know Gai will obey them directly. “If you find him first, we need him to be able to talk. We need to find out how much the Alliance knows.”

Gai nods his understanding and then marches away without another word. Kakashi heads for the ladder, dropping silently into the space between passenger cabins.

Two of three are dark and empty. In the third, Tsunade is asleep and clutching a bottle of sake to her chest, the lights on full blast. Kakashi doesn’t bother checking her over. The snoring is definitely real and probably a health condition. Yamato’s in the hallway then, double barrel shot gun in hand, and they quickly clear the other two cabins.

The infirmary – the best-stocked, most up to date thing on the ship by a long mile – is also dark and Kakashi leaves Yamato to clear it while he continues onto the cargo hold. It’s not a big ship and Kakashi knows all _Kyubi’s_ nooks and crannies better than anyone. No fucking mole is going to hide in her for long.

Turns out, he isn’t even trying to. Shinrai- _sensei_ is standing in the middle of the cargo bay, fiddling with his odd, overly secure lock box like he hasn’t a care in the world. Kakashi feels the distant memory of electricity in his skin tingle at his fingertips, but he tamps down the memory, pulling up his revolver while checking the corners of the hold for the other guy. There was a non-zero chance they were working together the whole time.

“You’re gonna want to take a step back now, sensei.” Kakashi spits the word like an insult.

“I’m sorry!” The other man says, his face still turned toward the box. “I had to check on some things and I wasn’t comfortable doing it in front of the entire crew-“

“I said,” The hammer of the revolver clicks back, the sound unmistakable and echoing the large space, “Step. Back. Now.”

Shinrai stands slowly, his hands outstretched, “Please,” He says, eyes wide as he faces down the barrel of a gun for the first time, “I can explain!”

“Is that so?” A third voice cuts in sharply, “I’d be curious to hear as well.”

Kakashi’s instinct is to shoot first and ask questions later, but they still don’t know what the Alliance knows, and by the time he’s turning to face the prospector has a clear line of sight and a short pistol aimed straight at him.

“Why don’t you put the gun down, Captain?” Kabuto says, glasses catching the light as he steps out of the shadows on the catwalk. “I wouldn’t want there to be any accidents.”

Feeling immensely put upon, Kakashi takes his finger off the trigger and slowly lowers the weapon to the ground, glaring at the fake teacher all the while. Shinrai keeps his eyes locked on Kabuto, fear and anger warring in them.

“Listen, okay, we didn’t know the cargo was marked, okay?” Kakashi hears himself saying, “We’re only on our way to release it to the proper authorities…”

Kakashi is mentally calculating how far they can get on their current amount of gas if they can’t get _any_ profit off the current cargo load (calculation: not very), when Kabuto snaps at him to shut up and turns his gun on Shinrai instead. “Iruka Umino, you’re under arrest.”

Kakashi blinks owlishly between their two passengers locked in a tense stand off and thinks for perhaps the first time in his life _Oh thank god, they want the other guy._

“On what charges?” Shinrai – _Iruka_ demands.

“Grand larceny. Breaking and entering into a federal facility. This list is as long as my arm _sensei_ , take your pick.” Kabuto sneers.

“He’s a fugitive?” Kakashi asks, trying to wonder what kind of trouble a mild mannered twenty two year old could have gotten himself into and then remembering himself at twenty-two. He smiles up at the white haired man despite the gun currently pointed his way. “I don’t suppose there’s some sort of bounty for the capture of a wanted fugitive…?”

“Oh, please, cut the pathetic act.” Kabuto sneers. “I know who you are, too, Kakashi Hatake. And more importantly, I know _what_ you are. The Alliance doesn’t give half-broken junkers like this _missions_. What was the plan? Drop them at a safehouse in Oto until the rest of your little resistance friends can pick them up? Well, it doesn’t matter now. There’s an Alliance interceptor on the way and all of you rotten independents will be put away once and for all.”

“Woah, easy now.” Kakashi raises his hands, sincerely confused, “I don’t what kind of operation this is but we are strictly - ”

Several things happen in rapid succession:

Gai bursts out of the second shuttle, saying, “Captain, the shuttle is clear!”

Kabuto shouts, “If one more person moves, I shoot the captain in the head!”

Kurenai and Asuma appear in the doorway of Kurenai’s shuttle, Asuma’s clothes are rumpled and his hair is a mess, he’s telling her, “I don’t know where they are, but I’m sure we’ll…”

Kabuto gets three gunshots off by the time Gai tackles and pins him to the mess of the catwalk. Two go wide. One finds a home in the tender flesh and organs of Asuma’s stomach.

The aftermath is an intense, high stress situation. Kakashi loses track of the teacher while trying to keep his friend’s lower intestines inside his body. In the moment, he thinks that’s probably fine. It’s not a big ship and at least they know he isn’t trying to get the Alliance’s attention.

A firm, perfectly manicured hand shoves him out of the way and a female voice says, “Let me do that, you idiot, you’ve got the pressure all wrong.”

Kakashi sort of rolls to the side as the drunk woman – now suspiciously clear-eyed – takes total command of the situation. Her hands keep moving fabric and damaged tissue around as she asks, “What does your infirmary look like?”

“We keep it stocked, but we don’t have a medic on board. Don’t usually run into these kinds of problems.” That last part’s a lie – they just can’t _afford_ a medic – but she doesn’t need to know.

“You have one now.” A fresh spurt of blood wells up from Asuma’s stomach and the woman holds back what looks like a very strong gag reflex. Kakashi doesn’t comment as long as her hands keep applying pressure. “Get a stretcher.” She orders him and he’s moving before she’s even finished her next sentence. “And you, stop crying and come put pressure right here. I need to get my med kit.”

Kakashi runs to the infirmary. His heart is racing, his blood rushing. He’s _fast_ when he wants to be. He’s at the infirmary in the space of a few heartbeats.

It’s not fast enough.

“You have to run from the Alliance Interceptor.” A tan, scarred face stares up at Kakashi from behind three inches of electro-tempered glass.

“What are you talking about?” Kakashi all but ignores his words, pounding on the door hard enough to bruise his fists. Not that it does him any good. The whole ship could blow and the infirmary would still be securely pressurized behind that door. “Open the damn door! He’s _dying_!”

“He _will die_ if you don’t tell your pilot to run right now.” Iruka glares at the intercom fixture on Kakashi’s side of the door and it slowly dawns on the captain what this asshole is trying to pull.

“If he dies,” Kakashi says, pressing his red and purpling knuckles to the door and speaking carefully so he can be heard through the glass, “You die.”

Iruka nods once, like he’s accepting a _deal_ instead of being threatened. Kakashi, infuriated, opens a line to the bridge, “Put as much mud in our wake as you can and get the fuck out of here. Any direction, just get out of their sensor range.”

“That might be a problem. Asuma said-”

“I know what he _said_. Do what _I’m_ saying _now_.” They might end up out of fuel and on the drift, but at least Asuma has a chance of survival. He’ll bleed out in minutes if they can’t get into the infirmary.

“Aye, Captain.” The line dies and the engines hum to life. The walls of the ship rattle softly as Sai pushes its already-damaged limits. Kakashi hates treating his ship like this. And he especially hates the man who put him in this situation.

Iruka waits until the whine of the engines shifts into a slightly higher pitch and then has the audacity to look _relieved_ as he rearranges wires in the doorframe to release the pressure locking mechanism.

It’s petty and childish and a waste of time but also completely fucking worth it to watch that relief turn to shock and pain when Kakashi grabs him by the neckline of his shirt and throws him into the nearest wall. “If I had the time to spare, I’d kill you right now.” He says, low and dark and close to the other man’s face. Then, he lets go of the shirt and points to the stretcher, tucked away neatly on the shelf. “Carry that to the hold. Go on. _Move_.”

Now that the ship is underway, the teacher seems to know better than to test his limits and obeys without a word. They’re back in the hold in moments.

“Took you long enough.” Tsunade narrows her eyes at the pair. “Why are we moving? I’ll need a steady surface to work on if you want him to survive the kind of surgery he needs.”

She’s got some kind of temporary patch over the hole in Asuma’s stomach so the bleeding has stopped for now, but his face is sickly pale and he’s babbling quiet things to Kurenai, who holds his hand so tight blood has pooled in his fingertips.

“You’ll have it. Our pilot’s may be an emotionless stiff, but he’s good at what he does. Won’t take but a minute to get clear of trouble.” Kakashi hopes he’s telling the truth. If the Alliance agent was able to give the interceptor their transponder code before they cut off his signal, there wasn’t anywhere in the ‘verse they’d be able to run no matter what mess Sai sent their way.

Since at this point Gai has the slightly unconscious agent in their only working cuffs, Kakashi makes the teacher carry one end of the stretcher so he can keep an eye on the other man’s movements. He motions for Gai to follow them to the infirmary and then the whole group starts the march through the ship.

_Kyubi_ is never taking on passengers again; not if Kakashi has to sell his own organs to get out of atmosphere.

Yamato appears as they all file into the infirmary and Kakashi has barely snapped out a _where the hell were you_ when he holds up a metal sphere with a glowing red interface.

“Sai picked up a secondary beacon. Long range.” He says without justifying Kakashi’s question. “Once I knew who had it, I circled back to his room to find and deactivate it.”

“Right. Of course. I’m…” He trails offs because he’s the captain and he’s not supposed to apologize on his ship even though he’s done nothing but fuck up for what feels like the last six years and Tsunade lets out a huff of disbelief and frustration.

“If you are _talking_ , but not operating on a _gunshot wound_ , leave the damn room!”

Only Kurenai stays, Asuma’s hand still gripped in hers, occasionally handing tools to the doctor.

There’s a small waiting area outside the infirmary. Someone had put a ratty, secondhand couch there along with a hardbacked chair and a low table; there’s a pack of playing cards on it and everything. A tiny, pathetic waiting room where no one ever waited. Gai pushes the semi-conscious Alliance agent into the chair and Kakashi pushes the fugitive-teacher towards Gai. Without asking for any explanation, Gai contorts the man into a sleeper hold.

“Captain?”

“Give me a minute.” He says. He hears Gai manhandle the teacher onto the couch as he turns around to lean his arm against the window and watch Tsunade do her work. About fifteen minutes after running, Sai announces an all clear over the intercom and she starts into Asuma’s guts, looking for the bullt.

“I’m done playing games.” Kakashi announces pushing himself away from the window, “Time to find out what the hell is going on. Gai, keep them in here.”

“Yes, Sir.” Gai responds, no flowery language or overdrawn statements. No time for that when a fellow soldier’s life hangs in the balance. Kakashi doesn’t look at either passenger-turned-prisoner, but somehow the teacher seems to work out his intention anyway.

“Wait! Stop!” Iruka starts to jump up after him but Gai’s there in an instant, holding him down. It doesn’t keep him from shouting. “You can’t do that!”

_Like hell I can’t_. Kakashi thinks it but doesn’t respond, stalking out of the infirmary. He captains his own ship so that _no one_ can tell him what he’s not allowed to do.

“We need to plot a course.” Sai is waiting in the short hallway that connects the infirmary and the hold. His tone is dry, unaffected by or not totally informed of the drama playing out in the infirmary, “We don’t have enough fuel to keep drifting, especially not if we have to make another run anytime soon.”

“Then you’d better make sure the Alliance can’t find us.” Kakashi snaps again. He usually tries to be gentle with their strange, cold, _young_ pilot, but today he’s run out of patience. “And stay in the bridge with the door locked. The last thing we need is that twice-damned teacher taking over the whole ship like he did with the infirmary.”

How a primary school teacher even _knew_ how to trip and trigger the emergency pressure-seal on the door was another question altogether.

He doesn’t wait for Sai’s acknowledgement, just keeps marching his way to the cargo hold and some damn answers.

He’s hard pressed to think of a worse day in his life that didn’t involve being in an active war zone.

It’s easy enough to find the cargo in question. The enormous, heavy crate they’d had to power lift on board is still sitting in the middle of the floor. Unsecured, which is bad protocol. If they’d had to take more serious evasive maneuvers to escape the interceptor it could have done real damage. As captain, he should probably yell at someone for that – Yamato? That was the sort of thing a First Officer was supposed to do, right? – but he’s too focused on getting to the bottom of today’s problems to worry about it.

There’s a bio-locked passcode pad on the lock, but it’s more flash than substance and only takes a few moments to bypass. The container lets out a quiet hiss of air and the pad flashes a one-word message: **RELEASE?**

“You can’t just open it!” The teacher is back, somehow. He bursts out of the passageway and down the short flight of stairs to the deck. He is followed closely by Gai who shouts apologies and looks affronted at having a prisoner escape his hold. The man makes it four entire steps into the bay before Gai leaps the railing and tackles him. Iruka just keeps fighting and protesting. “Please, you could hurt them if you don’t bring them out of cryo properly!”

Kakashi’s face, not that anyone can see it, twists with annoyance. The gun he pulls and aims at the teacher’s head is very visible, however, and the room finally falls quiet even when Yamato appears at the top of the stairs. Without another word from anyone, Kakashi pushes a button. **RELEASE**.

“No!” Iruka shouts with one last feeble struggle against Gai’s hold.

The top of the container opens on motorized hinges. The cryogenic packing material inside evaporates into gas faster than it can turn liquid. Kakashi has to take a step back and let the mess clear before he can see what, exactly, he’s been unintentionally smuggling since Persephone.

His grip on the gun tightens, hands shaking. “Gai, get him in the airlock.”

“It’s not what it looks like!”

“Go to Hell!” The teacher flinches when he shouts and Kakashi glances between his distressed face and the three naked, frozen _children_ asleep in the container. Bile rises in his throat. “No wonder you wanted to keep the Alliance off this boat – wouldn’t want Mommy and Daddy to find out you’re smuggling these very expensive playthings to whatever hideout you keep in the outer planets.”

“It isn’t _like that_.” The sick man has tears in his eyes. Kakashi gives him credit for his acting skills, but nothing else. “Please, they could be seriously hurt if they aren’t allowed to come to temperature in the proper environment.”

“I don’t know what _environment_ you had in mind, but I doubt _proper_ has anything-”

“He’s right, you know. Orochimaru would be upset if his property was damaged before it was returned to him.”

Yamato, looking annoyed, hands laced behind his head, steps through the doorway, but he isn’t the one speaking. Kabuto, looking markedly less dazed than before, walks into the hold after him, carrying a gun Kakashi’s never seen before.

“They’re not _possessions_.” Iruka shouts, slipping free of Gai’s newly slackened hold. “They’re children!”

Kakashi would admire his guts if it didn’t make Kabuto tighten his grip on the gun. Instead, he just wants him to shut up long enough for Kakashi to figure a way out of this before he needs the old drunk to pull bullets out of a full third of his crewmates.

“Whatever they are, they’ll be back under Lord Orochimaru’s care soon enough.” Kabuto says, “Captain Hatake, why don’t you grab the transmitter I dropped earlier and – “

He’s cut off by a sickening _thud_ of metal on flesh-covered bone and Kabuto collapses forward on the railing; unconscious again. Sai is standing behind him, a heavy wrench held loosely in his right hand. The pilot has that dead-eyed look he gets sometimes. The one that gives Kakashi a chill and a lot of doubts his first officer has to allay. The kid’s eyes briefly meet Kakashi’s. Then he smiles an empty smile and gives a one-shouldered shrug. “Sorry for leaving the bridge. I know I’m not supposed to question orders.”

The iron wrench onto the walkway with a _clang_ and Sai disappears back into the ship.

_I probably deserved that._ Kakashi thinks. He looks around at the quiet, dazed cargo hold and all the people still staring up at where Sai had been just a moment earlier. He sighs, holstering his gun.

“Gai, go see if that bastard is alive. If he is, tie him up properly. Yamato, when he wakes see what you can get out of him. I need to know what her told the Alliance before we scrambled his connection.” Gai lets go of Iruka’s leg with a _Yosh_! and heads up the stairs, Yamato shaking out his arms and trailing behind.

Kakashi and Iruka exchange a long stare. The shorter man doesn’t back down, but he also doesn’t try to get close to the container again. Finally, Kakashi speaks.

“I think it’s time you gave me the full story. And it better be fucking good or I’m spacing you and dropping these kids on the nearest inhabited planet.”

Iruka nods seriously, opens his mouth to speak.

And then a blonde head pops up out of the container and starts _screaming_.


	2. PART TWO

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The teacher explains himself. The captain makes a decision.

“Don’t wanna sleep no more, Sensei.” The boy babbles sleepily as Iruka hooks him up to an IV. “Gotta get Sasuke and Sakura. Gotta keep ‘em safe, ya know?”

“They are safe, Naruto.” Iruka reassures the boy, stroking his shaved head gently as he feeds sedatives into the drip. “You kept them safe. And you won’t have to sleep for much longer.”

“Promise?” Naruto asks, eyes shutting as Iruka eases him down onto a cot.

“I promise.” Iruka swears even though the boy is already asleep. The man stands there for a long moment to look tenderly over the sleeping, warming children. 

It had taken a while to get the first boy to calm down, and then longer to wrestle all three limp bodies into some adult-sized hospital gowns. The other boy, Sasuke, had stirred a little while being carried to the bay, but the girl hadn’t woken at all. Tsunade, still covered in blood up to her elbows and sitting next to a wastebasket full of sick, said it was all perfectly normal after an extended cryogenic freeze.

Watching Iruka watch them, deeply asleep on emergency cots in the brightly lit infirmary, Kakashi could almost believe the man’s intentions were pure. That he is somehow a rescuer instead of a kidnapper. It’s a pretty thought. 

Kakashi pushes it away with a shake of his head. Life has taught him better than that. Nobody’s ever kind for kindness's sake. There’s always an agenda. He clears his throat, breaking the momentary peace.

The teacher glances at him and then to Tsunade.

“I know what to do.” Tsunade says, though she doesn’t say how or why. She knocks back a glass of water from the tap and shoos them away, “Go sort things out with the Captain.”

Iruka nods his thanks and follows Kakashi out the door. He doesn’t talk and neither does the Captain. The silence between them is heavy; Kakashi obviously sizing him up and Iruka thinking hard over what he’s going to say. When they pass the stairs leading up to the bridge, Kakashi turns his good eye to the teacher and orders, “Stay here.”

He nods and doesn’t move, so Kakashi takes the last few stairs alone and pokes his head onto the bridge. “Yo, Sai, family meeting.”

A regular Captain probably would have called it an  _ all hands _ meeting or simply a  _ crew _ meeting. But this is Kakashi’s ship and he’ll call it whatever he damn well pleases.

Sai doesn’t turn from his place at the controls, a brush pen and paper sketchbook open in front of him. “Thought I wasn’t supposed to leave the bridge?”

“Once is enough to make your point.” Kakashi tells him, keeping his tone light. “Twice is petulant. Anymore and you’re just being bratty.”

Sai contemplates this information like he does every small interpersonal exchange and Kakashi hopes he takes the gentle, teasing advice for the apology it’s meant to be. Cataloging the information for future use, Sai takes a beat and then nods once.

“Good.” Kakashi praises. He smiles with his one visible eye and says, “Make sure we’re not going to drift into anything and then join us in the mess.”

_ The Mess _ is really just half a kitchen, a droopy couch, and a long, scuffed table welded into the floor. The chairs around it are supposed to be magnetic to keep from sliding around during turbulence, but they only work about half the time. It smells a little like rust and a lot like old protein rations with a hint of recycled air under everything. There’s a light over the sink that’s always flickering a little bit. The whole place is a real dump.

It’s Kakashi’s favorite spot on the ship.

And now he’s going to decide if a man lives or dies in it. Why do all his favorite things end up like this?

Gai, Yamato, and Kurenai are already waiting. Kurenai isn’t technically crew, but she’s been renting her shuttle long enough to know how decisions get made and she’s clearly decided to take part in this one. Which means she has a strong enough that she’s left Asuma’s side for the moment. Kakashi contemplates kicking her out but knows in his heart it’s not worth the effort. Her opinions are rarely wrong. He glances at Gai.

“The agent?”

“Unconscious, but alive.” Gai gives him a broad, toothy smile. “Cuffed and tied to my free weight stand with safety wire.”

Kakashi almost winces at the thought. Gai’s free weight stand totaled something close to a half a ton. Nobody was getting out of that without serious damage. He nods his approval and takes a seat at the table, across from Yamato. When Iruka starts to reach for the seat beside him, Kakashi pulls it in with his foot and turns his face up. “Better start talking,  _ sensei _ .”

Iruka nods, trying to pass off his stumble as a motion to smooth down the front of his heavy jacket. He clears his throat and looks at each face in the room. The crew stares back with the silent intensity of a school of sharks circling blood in the water. Sai appears in the same door through which they entered and takes up a spot on the far wall, leaning against it with one leg up. A perfectly casual pose that contrasts with the dark intent in his gaze. Everyone is waiting for the teacher to tell his first lie.

The captain turns his chair around so he’s facing the same direction as everyone else and gestures vaguely in the air. A silent order to  _ get on with it already. _

Iruka takes a slow, deep breath and the crew watches as he visible pulls himself together; feet planted shoulder width apart, spine straight, shoulders back, arms relaxed at his side. When he speaks, his voice is clear and smooth, “I’d only been teaching for two years when I was head-hunted by a Federal education program that called itself  _ The Academy _ .”

It’s easy to picture the man before them in front of a classroom, reciting multiplication tables or lecturing on the history of the warring Daimyos. He has the honest face and easy friendliness of a perfect sitcom teacher. If that makes him more suspect or less, Kakashi can't tell yet.

“I probably should have been suspicious from the start, but I paid the fees to cancel my work contract with the school and accepted a position at The Academy the same day I got the offer.” He shakes his head, frowning. “I was arrogant and I was an idiot. But after the first year it seemed like I was right. The kids they’d recruited for my class were amazing! Certified geniuses, martial arts prodigies, accomplished musicians and artists! The most incredible, exceptional learners I’d ever seen. And I had endless resources to teach them. The intense academic program matched to a rigorous physical fitness and nutrition program. It was hard work – they were all so much smarter than me it was almost overwhelming – but it was fulfilling work. The kids made progress like I’d never seen.”

His shoulders relax as he talks about the first year, his face softens. It’s clearly a fond time in his memory and he loses himself in it for a moment.

Yamato folds his hands on the table and leans forward, “What, exactly, does this story have to do with the kids in our hold?” 

“Ah, sorry.” Iruka scratches his face in embarrassment, a hint of red under his skin. He clears his throat and straightens again, “My point is that it was a total contrast to the second year – the year I met Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura. Their class was wilder, their skills less compatible, and it made for rough going from the start. There was more pressure from the administration, too, which I first thought was just normal new-curriculum jitters. But they kept pushing me to test and examine with such intensity, I eventually I realized they were looking for something, I just couldn’t figure out what.

“Near the end of the second term, I was asked to select nine students out of thirty. No one else would be allowed to move on in the program. I tried to argue – pointing out that pitting them against each other was exactly the opposite of the program’s stated praxis – but my supervisors were insistent. I had to select nine or lose my position. This was around the same time that Naruto was hitting the peak of his problem-child routine.”  Iruka’s face, which was deeply serious, goes soft again when he talks about Naruto. “He reminded me so much of myself at that age, I couldn’t help but give him extra time and help. He was smart and  _ good; _ I knew he could keep up with the very best of his classmates, if only he could learn to focus. But by the end of term, I had accepted that I just couldn’t pass him.

"That's when he found out about the cut off from some another teacher. He – well, he pulled some seriously dangerous stunts, but in the end he convinced me to pass him. It was more than just his ability. The Academy was the only stable home he’d had. The friends he’d made – Sasuke and Sakura chief among them – were closest thing to family he knew. I thought I was doing right by him, passing him on even if he wasn’t totally ready. If I’d  _ known _ everything I did now, I would have just kept him with me!”

This last is an outburst, a sort of wail of regret that bursts through Iruka’s calm recollection. The man seems on the verge of tears. Kakashi doesn’t have time or interest in emotional outbursts at the moment, so he folds his arms and asks, “What is it you know now?”

“The Academy was never meant to be a school.” Iruka replies, gathering himself yet again, but there’s a rage simmering under his veneer of calm now. He hands slowly curl into fists as he talks. “It was a proving ground, a way for the Alliance to quietly separate talented kids from their guardians and test them for a secret program it was developing. By the time I returned from the term break, the school was gone. Disappeared completely. But not just the place, the  _ kids _ were gone. Like they had never existed. I tried to get hold of the authorities, of their  _ families _ , but no one would listen. Too afraid or too complicit to go looking for them.

“For a year and a half, I poured everything I had into finding them. I spent every cent, used up every ounce of professional goodwill. And I couldn’t find  _ anything _ .” He pauses for a long moment, considering the stony faces before him. “I know this all sounds insane, but please believe me! All I wanted was for my students to be safe.”

In a better universe, the story would be ridiculous. Kakashi would throw the man out the airlock and take the kids to the proper authorities for treatment and professional care. But Yamato’s expression is hard and serious, nodding along as if to a story he’s heard before. Sai’s face is carefully blank, expertly repressing whatever trauma he’s already been through. Gai and Kurenai meet his eyes and he sees doubt and concern on their faces, but not an ounce disbelief.

Kakashi knows this is all too possible. 

The captain sighs and says, “So, a year and a half of looking and no dice. How’d you find them?”

Iruka lets out a humorless laugh. “Turns out, if you make enough noise people eventually find  _ you _ .”

“The Alliance?” Gai asks, eyes sharp.

He nods, “The Alliance, yes, but also… not-Alliance. I was in a jail cell, expecting to be disappeared like the school I was supposed to have forgotten, when some Independents broke me out. They were also looking for the kids. Naruto, in particular.”

“Why? That’s a lot of risk for a handful of missing kids.” It’s not that they’d ignored these kinds of problems back when he’d been a part of the Independent movement, but working so deep in the Core seemed like an awfully high risk scenario for less than a dozen kids, no matter how special.

“I didn’t know it when I was teaching, and l don’t think he knows at all, but Naruto,” Iruka hesitates for half a second, checking over the faces in the room again before reminding himself he doesn’t really have a choice but to tell the truth. “Naruto is Naruto Uzumaki, son of fourth Hokage, Minato Namikaze.”

_ Uzumaki _ .

The axis of the universe spins around Kakashi, his hands clenching and unclenching around nothing.  _ Kushina died before giving birth. _ His panicked brain tells him.  _ She died in the fight on the station. It was confirmed. No survivors. She didn’t have a chance to give birth. Did no one look for the child? Why didn’t  _ I _ look for the child? Could I really have left Minato’s only legacy survive on his own, in Alliance hands, for all these years? _

“Captain.” Gai’s voice is low and steady near Kakashi’s ear. Kakashi hasn’t moved except to grip the table with one hand, but Gai knows anyway. Has known too much for too long and Kakashi doesn’t understand why he’s still around. “Wherever you’re going, I challenge you to stay here instead.”

The words have a nearly instantaneous steadying affect, although guilt still eats through Kakashi’s heart. He relaxes half a centimeter. The blue eyes, the blond hair. It seems obvious now. He clears his throat, trying to brush off the last few seconds. He focuses back on Iruka, “How did you get them out?”

“The Independents did most of it.” Iruka freely admits, “I just had to show up when they said and ask no questions. I had a small part in the actual extraction – it’s why we got all three of them and not just Naruto – but I was mostly cosmetic. Then they gave me fake ID’s and some cash and told me to go to ground for as long as I could. I’ve been looking for a secure place to defrost them ever since. That was about a month ago.”

“They didn’t tell you where to go?” Kakashi asks, jaw tightening with rage. Fail the kid for a dozen-odd years and then toss him into space? Who was even running the operation these days? Kakashi had a lot of questions and he didn’t like the answers that were shaping up. “They didn’t give you a safe house or a way to contact them?”

Iruka shakes his head. “I’m pretty sure all they wanted was to make sure Namikaze’s kid didn’t pop up one day as a talking head for the Alliance. Beyond that, they didn’t seem to have the resources to do much else.”

Kakashi has his doubts, but he keeps them to himself. The mess falls quiet. For quite a long time. Eventually, Kakashi glances up from his own thoughts and realizes everyone is waiting on him.

_ Ah, _ he thinks,  _ right. We’re all caught up to now. Time to make a decision. _

Kakashi runs through a roster of possible responses and settles on one. A part of him wants this all to be true, but a member of his crew has been shot today and he’s not in a very trusting mood. “Let’s see.” He recounts, “There’s a mysterious, disappearing school, an evil administration, the missing heir of a famous, dead resistance leader, and a handful of allies willing to risk breaking three kids out of a highly secured facility but not make sure they arrived anywhere else safely. If this were a book, I’d have a few notes about believability.”

Iruka opens his mouth to protest, face turning red at the insult, but another voice interrupts. “Don’t be an ass, Hatake.”

Tsunade sweeps into the room, leveling a harsh glare at him. Seeing Iruka’s concerned face, she says more gently, “The kids are fine. They’ll sleep for a few more hours, at least. And you,” Her voice hardens as she turns on Kakashi, “You know as well as I do that he’s telling the truth.”

“Why on Earth would I know that?” He asks, enjoying the weight of the ancient expression.

“We both saw the kid. That’s Minato’s flesh and blood alright.” The woman, who until about three hours ago, Kakashi had known as nothing but a lazy drunk, looks at him with clear, cutting eyes that seem to know too much. “Don’t do your mentor the dishonor of denying it.”

“And why on  _ Earth _ ,” Kakashi repeats, darkly. “Would you know that?”

“I know an awful lot, Hatake.” She tells him, crossing her arms firmly.

“One of these days you’ll need to tell me how you know so much.”

She lets out a laugh, loud and unabashed. “I’ll do no such thing and you’ll deal with it for as long as you need a competent medic. I have patients to look after, you have a ship to run and a dead man to do right by. Don’t let your fear of failure get in the way this time.”

She leaves the room as quickly and silently as she left it, but she might as well have thrown a bucket of ice over him. He hates how much he needs a medic at the moment, because he really,  _ really _ wants to know things about the woman. Kakashi feels eyes staring at him again, and he slaps the table hard enough to startle the tense teacher, turning back to his crew. 

“Alright.” He says, forcing himself to sound cheery and resetting the tone of the room. “Sai: set us on course to Oto as quick as you can without breaking anything. As long as Asuma is down, there is a  _ strict _ no breaking things policy in place. Gai: I want you to head back to your bunk and sit on Kabuto. He’s a slippery bastard and if he puts holes in any more of my crew, we’re going to have a problem.

“Yamato: when that asshole wakes up, find out what you can about what he was able to tell that interceptor. They’re not chasing us, so they probably don’t have our transponder code, but they know our heading it doesn’t matter, they’d beat us there. And Kurenai…” He trails off, belatedly remembering he can’t give Kurenai orders.

“I’ll be in the infirmary with Asuma.” She tells him, hands folded neatly over the silk of her dress. Her eyes flick up to Iruka, “Do you have clothes for the children, sensei?”

“A few things,” He says, “In my bag. I couldn’t afford much.”

She nods, “I should have a few things that will fit the girl, I’ll bring them to you. And some extra blankets. After everything they’ve been through, they shouldn’t have to wake up cold in the infirmary.”

“Thank you.” Iruka says, bowing with deep gratitude. “I… that would be a great kindness.”

She nods and then stands, all effortless elegance and generosity. When she looks down at Kakashi, it’s with a glare that says  _ don’t you dare fuck this up _ .

Kakashi swallows and gives her a small shrug; half-reassurance, half apology. He is probably going to fuck this up.

When she leaves the mess, it’s just him and the teacher left, everyone else scattered to complete their various tasks. Kakashi grabs the back of the chair he’d tucked in a minutes earlier, and sets it back a few inches. Iruka gets the point and takes a seat beside him.

The other man is stiff, his hands fold together on the surface of the table. Kakashi lets him stew for a minute, leaning back into his own seat with exaggerated laziness. Finally, he says, “We’re going to land on Oto in ten hours. If our business there goes well, you and the kids will get off there. It’s a backwater, but it’s quiet. People there take care of their own business, you won’t see much Alliance.”

Iruka nods seriously, “And if your business doesn’t go well?”

“Mah,” Kakashi shrugs, “Then we’ll probably be needing to get out quick. We’ll stick to the flight plan and put down on Shimo and you all can get off there instead. Busier, though, more regular patrols. If you really are a decent teacher, grab a posting on some moon on the edge and high tail it there. Outer moons always need teachers. In the meantime, keep your kids quiet and confined to the infirmary or your cabin. I don’t want them wandering around my boat.”

“I understand.” Iruka agrees, “I’ll keep them out of your way. And… thank you.”

The thanks is quiet, practically a whisper, but so heartfelt Kakashi feels another wave of guilt roll over him. He wants to be sick. He clasps the other man’s shoulder harshly and says, “Forget about it.”

That’s what he plans to do, anyway. He's spent a lot of time running from the past the doctor and the teacher are trying to drag up and he doesn't plan to give into it now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The best part of every SciFi story - the exposition!! Thanks for reading to the end. More action to come. As a sidenote, I just watched Cowboy Bebop for the first time and 1 (One) was anyone going to tell me this seminal anime is a space western or was I supposed to watch it on a whim for myself!? And 2 (Two) what the hell is that ending, my dudes? Where are my kids Ed and Ein???? Someone go back for them STAT!


End file.
